Culture and identity

• Culture


  Sociologists use this term to refer to language, traditions, beliefs, norms & values. Culture is the way of living of a particular society.
• Cultures differ from one society to another. Countries might have different values (some are based on the religion of a particular country), traditions, beliefs, norms & values.
• Socialization


  The process through which we learn our society's culture. Through this process, we learn all the essential things we need to learn in order to fit & live in our society.
• Different aspects of culture

  • Dominant Culture
  • Subcultures
  • Folk Culture
  • High Culture & Low Culture
• Dominant Culture


  The particular culture which is more dominant over the others in a particular country. The values, norms, ethnicity & lifestyle of this particular culture are followed by the majority of the people in a country.
• Subcultures


  Smaller cultures which are in some ways different from the dominant culture, but these might also have some things in common with the dominant culture. They are not dominant.
• Subcultures of resistance


  Subcultures that rebel against the dominant culture of society. They want to go the opposite of the mainstream culture.
• Subcultures of resistance


  • The 'lads' - a group of teenage working-class boys who rebelled against the dominant culture of the school
  • Punks & skinheads who rebelled against the dominant culture of their society
• Folk Culture


  A culture created by the local communities and developed through their beliefs & experiences. It is very authentic because it is created by ordinary people of a particular society, and consists of folk music, dances, storytelling and traditions that are passed down from one generation to the next.
• High Culture


  The culture of the upper class, which consists of opera music, theatre drama, ballet, fine arts, literature. It is generally seen as superior to other forms of cultures.
• Low Culture


  The mass, popular or low culture, which consists of culture appreciated by ordinary people. It is considered to be inferior to the high-class culture.
• Popular Culture


  A commercially produced culture aimed at the lower class. It involves cultural products produced for profit by mass production industrial techniques for ordinary people to buy. These products are short-lived.
• Marxists believe that the high culture imposes on society what counts as good taste and as bad taste, therefore, their taste and culture are considered to be a hegemony.
• Marxists from the Frankfurt School believe that the popular culture is a mass deception, it is an illusion. They believe that the high class wants us to conform to their ideas of what is good & bad taste so they can increase their profits.
• Strinati does not accept the claim that people are passive, accept and consume the popular culture. He believes that they are able to choose from the diversity that the popular culture offers and critically respond to it.
• Livingstone found that writers and producers of TV soap operas (like East Enders) which are popular culture because they are watched by millions, argue that these have positive benefits for society as they make people more aware of certain controversial issues.
• The difference between the high culture & the low culture is weakening. High class is no longer for elites only, everyone is given the chance of choosing products which appeal to them irrelevant of their social class.
• Globalization has led to global culture, where we have all become more alike since we are being exposed to different cultures through the use of media & through tourism.
• Identity


  How individuals or groups see and define themselves, and how other individuals or groups see and define them.
• Personality


  More fixed, has to do with psychological aspects like if the person is introvert or extrovert, selfish or generous.
• I and the Me

  The I refers to the inner self, the real me (things that make me unique). The ME refers to the self that develops through social interactions and experiences, which means how others see me.
• Different types of Identity

  • Individual or Personal Identity
  • Social Identity
  • Collective Identity
• Individual or Personal Identity

  Woodward argues that it has to do with the question of 'Who am I?'. How individual define themselves, what is important to them, how they see themselves and what characteristics make them unique & different from others. For example name, passport, ID card number, finger print, birth certificate. This is the I that Mead speaks about.
• Social Identity

  The social group's individuals are part of define who you are as well. This might include the men and women, ethnic or national groups. All of these groups that the individual is part of gives him or her an identity.
• Collective Identity

  This is shared by a group that is why it is called collective. When an individual might be different from those around him or her but they all have one thing in common for example: support the same artist or footballer, feminist, environmentalist, a gang member, animal rights activist.
• Multiple Identities

  An individual might have more than one identity, meaning that they have different selves in different situations. An individual might be a son, brother, student, painter, uncle and more.
• Stigmatized or Spoiled Identities

  Stigma is when you have one characteristic about you which is seen as abnormal to the mainstream of society. Therefore, because of this aspect, you will not be accepted by the rest of society. Ex: ex-prisoner, individual with impairment. Goffman says that stigmatized identity is an identity which is undesirable or exclude people from society. Stigmatized identities leave negative impacts on the individual, people treat them differently. Ex: ex-prisoner trying to find a new job.
• Socialization

  A process that we go through in order to learn our society's culture, values, norms & expected behaviour. This process helps us to learn what is accepted in our society and what is expected from us.
• Resocialization


  This concept shows us that the individual is always striving to adapt to his/her new environment. Resocialization happens when an individual changes his/her environment. These changes can be either mild or dramatic.
• Mild change

  • A child changes his/her school environment
• Dramatic change


  • An individual changes the country that he/she lives in, or a prisoner entering or leaving prisoner
• Socialization is nurture because it has to do with the upbringing of children. Nurture (socialization and upbringing) is considered to be more important than nature (biology) as it has the power to turn individuals in full members of society.
• The importance of socialization and how it binds people into society can be seen in feral children cases. These children are either locked in rooms without any human contact or thrown in the woods and are raised by animals. Since they will not have any human contact, they will not be able to learn the essential things they need to learn in order to fit & function in society.
• Identity is a social construction because it is something which is created through the process of socialization, meaning through daily interactions. It is not something that is given by biology/nature.
• Primary Socialization


  This is the first socialization we go through; the family is the agent of socialization here. Parsons who is a functionalist look at primary socialization as something very important because it helps babies to turn into social beings. We form our identity during this stage and the majority of us remain with the same identity throughout our life.
• Secondary Socialization


  Continues to build on primary socialization, this is carried out by the school, work, peer group and other secondary agents of socialization. This is beyond what we learn from our family members. This is when we start meeting new individuals who teach us something different every day.
• Agents of Primary Socialization

  • Family
• Agents of Secondary Socialization

  • School
  • Workplace
  • Religion
  • Media
  • Peer Group
• Identity


  The way individuals see themselves through the interactions they have and by reflecting on their experiences
• Family as an agent of socialization


  Through this agent of socialization, we learn all the essential things we need to know in order to function as full social beings in society. We learn our culture, norms, values, lifestyle, how to talk, walk and eat. We learn what is expect and accepted in our society.